Summary
Do computing companies these days need to give good service? I think they should, I cling to the belief that they might, and I'm quite sure they must if they want my money. (Warning: this post may disabuse any readers who think that the English don't know how to complain!)

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Monopolies over any domain are bad, whether they be commercial, architectural, geo-political,
C++-librarial, cultural, even culinary.

So it was with some feeling of "doing the right thing" that I recently placed an
order for my first ever
computer-by-a-certain-manufacturer-which-emphasises-visual-style.
I fancied expanding my experience out of the UNIX / Win32 sphere, and thought,
in a veritable splurge of philanthropic muse, that I might implement ports for
some of my libraries to another architecture. I fancied I might also write articles about the experiences I was going to have in developing for this new platform. Oh, what disappointment lay around the corner!

Because I had the temerity (/ caution / foresight) to request more disk and memory
than the standard configuration, I was informed that my order would take 6-8 days. "Ok." A day later I rang to add a carry-case to the order, and was informed at that point
that likely delivery was now going to be an additional 3 days. "Ok, I guess." A week later I rang to confirm that the delivery was imminent, to be informed that it would arrive one day later than previously indicated. "Hmmm. What gives? Is this death by a thousand cuts? Ah well, one more day won't kill me."

On the appointed day, I awoke full of trepidation at the challenges of networking a
new machine, installing compilers, setting up environments, etc. Alas, I received
an automated email informing me that my order was going to be shipped - that's
shipped, mind, not delivered! - in a further 12 days!!

Thus underwhelmed by their performance, I rang to cancel my order. I was further
taken aback by the attitude of the representative to whom I spoke - after the several
minutes of waiting, piped music and all - which can best be described as brusque.
Indeed, she actually appeared quite offended that I was cancelling the order. Perhaps
this company is too cool to have customers cancelling orders?

This was to have been the first non-PC machine I would have purchased in some years.
Other (PC) vendors who have occasionally had issues with timely delivery have, at
the least, appeared genuinely concerned about the possible impact to my business,
and some have even offered some kind of discount/recompense. They've maintained
my repeated business not through great service, to be sure, but through at-least-adequate service. Amazingly, the representative to whom I spoke seemed barely able to raise the energy to ask the reasons for my cancelling the order, and attempted not one whit of regret/persuasion/how-may-we-help-rectify-this?.

Suffice to say, my one experience as a potential customer of that company
was devoid of satisfaction. Tellingly, there was no clearly identifiable email address
to which to send an email of complaint, and sending to others on their website apparently
went straight into the bit-bucket. Clearly their appreciation for new customers manifests
in a very strange way. I find myself wondering how it is, by treating potential customers
this way, that they haven't achieved a dominant market share?

From now on, when I buy my PCs I will feel that little bit less screwed-over / choice-limited,
since I've tried the opposition and it didn't taste good at all. Not only have they lost
the potential of several thousand dollars per year from my company, but also lost
themselves the chance of any positive recommendations to others I might have made had
I actually got my hands on the hardware in sub-glacial time.

Am I living in a dream world? Does serving their customers matter to anyone these days? What are your experiences? Does someone have a band-aid for my aching third finger? Pass the ice-cream ...

I recently bought from Dell, and their customer service blew me away. The salesperson I spoke to was very helpful. She mentioned various upgrades but didn't push them. And when I pointed out that I really didn't need the free printer that came with the laptop, they knocked £20 off the price.

A few days later they introduced a free postage deal on the model I had bought, so I rang them back to see if I could get the deal despite the fact I had already ordered. Without hesitation they agreed, and I saved another £50.

This was all done through their Indian call centre, the sort of place that seems to get a bad reputation for serving customers. It just goes to show that it's not where the customer services are located that matters, but how well trained they are and how empowered they are.